T_Boone_Pickens_Esq's Reviews

Fargo: The Tender Trap (2023)

Season 5, Episode 6

3/10

23 January 2024

FX is now a subsidiary of Disney, so guess what "messages" are force-fed to to audience. Yes, all the typical ones.

Do the Coen Brothers watch this show anymore before it airs? There's NOTHING Coen Brothers about this show anymore.

Each episode is worse than the last, with one-dimensional characterisation that is better suited to a Saturday-Night-Live sketch than to - what should be - a mystery/thriller TV show.

I never quit a show half way through a season, but I can't bring myself to press the play button on my remote again.

Anything made with Disney money, since 2010, should be avoided at all costs.

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Fargo: The Tiger (2023)

Season 5, Episode 5

4/10

smug political browbeating

23 January 2024

I'm five episodes into this series so far, and it's grown more political with each episode. Now we have characters sitting across from one another espousing their political opinions at one another, and guess who's made to look like the hero.. and guess who's made to look like the fool..

Both Hollywood and big-tech TV are so busy drinking their own coolaid that they consistently alienate their primary audience - that being ordinary people, who don't need to be lectured to by an industry infected by immoral charlatans masquerading as society's moral arbiter.

Enough already.

Seasons 1-3 were superb, because the writers were interested in telling riveting stories, not ramming their politics down the audience's throat. I recommend stopping there.

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Greenberg (2010)

1/10

Difficult to engage with selfish people

29 March 2022

Warning: Spoilers

I was enjoying this until:

she: "my ex made me pregnant 6 weeks ago" he: "oh ok" she: "I'll get an abortion" he: "oh ok"

Off to hospital they go, their "inconvenience" fixed, and on with their lives they go.

Hollywood is cancer.

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Arrival (II) (2016)

6/10

Overrated movie hiding behind a slick veneer

21 February 2022

Warning: Spoilers

Ticks most of the saccharine feel-good boxes.

"one language will save us" "if we're all the same we'll be saved" "out of the way boys, a woman's intuition coming through to save the world"

Insert various syrupy shots of losing a child to illness, then present the experience as having been "worth it" and "worth repeating" (I'm not sure the child would approve tbh...)

I found it to be overly maudlin and self-indulgent, with a strong whiff of student-film about it.

On positives. It's well shot, paced and acted.

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Grease (1978)

5/10

far too camp, too long, and with no moral centre

10 October 2020

The cinematography is strong, with beautiful (if unimaginative) compositions throughout. and there are occasional moments of charm.

The songs are occasionally catchy, but many feel like they belong on some insufferable cruise ship tour.

The film is also far too long. With many scenes overstaying their welcome.

Overall, it's far too camp. The men in the film feel like gay men trying to act straight, and it's awful.

The narrative: that Sandy has to act like a tramp to get Danny's attention is a terrible lesson for young women. Films like this should have a moral centre, and this one sorely lacks one.

For a classy musicals, start with these: Meet Me in St. Louis - The Wizard of Oz - Charlie and the Chocolate Factory - Little Shop of Horrors - The Blues Brothers

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Suits: War (2013)

Season 2, Episode 16

shoehorning a shoehorn

18 September 2020

I love this show, and I've really enjoyed it so far. All of the characters are "knowable" like good friends, and the storylines are always catchy and interesting.

But this episode was a TURKEY. They shoehorned in too many things that felt incongruent, and the final scene with Mike and Rachel (I won's spoil it) felt forced and hamfisted. The characters deserve better!

This episode was tone deaf, and I'm confused that it scored a 8.9 here on IMDB... how? is everyone taking crazy pills?

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6 Underground (2019)

1/10

Incoherent Dreck

9 August 2020

Bay... back in the Simpson/Bruckheimer era you were excellent. But this... WHAT HAPPENED???

It's an incoherent and noisy mess.

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Dead Calm (1989)

4/10

I had to turn it off half way

12 October 2019

It starts well, with good characterisation and pathos. You'll be immediately rooting for the protagonists.

But from the moment Billy Zane arrives it devolves into utter nonsense. The mood of the first 20 minutes is shattered and replaced with trite, shallow and ineffectual nonsense.

Zane flits between playful child and petulant teenager at the flick of a switch, and instead of coming off schizophrenic, it instead comes off as contrived. The suspension of disbelief flutters away like a fart in the wind.

Avoid this. Watch Cape Fear instead (either version).

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Diana: In Her Own Words (I) (2017 TV Movie)

7/10

Trading Happiness for Destiny

23 April 2019

This is a great food-for-thought documentary. I can't promise you'll side with Diana or not, it leaves you to build your own opinion.

What struck me was that Diana knew what she was getting into, but marched inexorably forward as if she was powerlessly drawn to a destiny she'd chosen for herself as a child.

There's a compelling inevitability to the whole thing that reflects our own lives, and our own choices, back at us. How many times have you known that a certain course of action will bring you pain and suffering, and yet you continue down the path without heeding your better instincts? Perhaps that's the compelling factor in Diana's story.

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The Predator (2018)

3/10

A charmless lazy mess

24 September 2018

I give 3 stars for: It ran at a smooth 24fps. It was in full colour. The audio never cut out. My seat was comfortable.

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Silence (I) (2016)

5/10

Beautifully shot. Poorly paced. Sectarian Religion 'Beat-em-Up'.

3 January 2017

Beautifully shot: I was reminded of many Kurosawa films, Seven Samurai in particular. The performances are also strong and believable. Scorsese gets a far better performance from Garfield than Gibson could in the wreck 'Hackwsaw Ridge'.

Where the film falls down is in the dull and long-winded script. Paced in a "and then and then and then" fashion. Making the film a chore to sit through.

Sadly, the film resorts to incongruent narration in the 3rd act in order to wrap things up. It feels like a last minute editing decision to prevent the film from being four hours long.

It's a religious-zeal gore fest of unending brutality and suffering. Viewers with a larger world-view may find this film to be obtuse and childish.

*note* I am a dedicated fan of Scorsese's work, my favourite being King of Comedy. Therefore giving 'Silence' a 5***** rating was difficult for me. I wanted to enjoy this film, but couldn't. I feel that it is objectively a poor film.

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Suicide Squad (2016)

2/10

Movies I've also rated a 2 are.....

17 December 2016

There's nothing I can tell you about this "movies"s shortcomings that you don't already know. So perhaps a list of my other 2-star ratings will give you an idea what quality-ballpark this POS belongs in:

Jay and Seth Versus the Apocalypse, Running with Scissors, Closer, Rust and Bone, Safe House, Waiting...

And here are some of my 3 star films, that I think are SH*T, but still better than Suicide Squad:

Rita Sue and Bob Too!, Redbelt, Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice, Ghostbusters 2016, The Neon Demon, Transformers: Age of Extinction, John Wick, The Dark Knight Rises, The Equalizer 2014, Blue Valentine, A Million Ways to Die in the West, RoboCop 2014, The Happening, Mortal Kombat, Enlighten Up!

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Ghostbusters: Answer the Call (2016)

1/10

feels like a school-play (with an odd / resentful tone)

24 July 2016

Feels like a fan-film / school-play made by a team that were too busy laughing at their own in-jokes to realise they're not funny. It has a slightly misandric tone to it too which feels really out of place. And the in-joke stabs at YouTube commenters make the filmmakers appear childish, small minded and petty. No professional film-making here.

On a positive note; the character animation was actually very well done, Slimer in particular. But it's really unfortunate that the (clearly very skilled) animators had to beautifully animate very dumb ideas. Oh well.

Kristen Wiig, imo, is the world's funniest living actress. I'm laughing before she even speaks, she owns my funny bone. But she cannot elevate this film. I feel it is beneath her.

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Rust and Bone (2012)

2/10

left me cold

24 March 2013

Warning: Spoilers

The protagonists:

*** Her: A cold and callous ball-cutter. She hits nightclubs on her own, brings home nightclub bouncers, disrespects and emasculates her boyfriend. Also, she works with whales yet never smiles and shows no love for these beautiful creatures... and we are supposed to care when she loses her legs? I found her utterly unrelatable.

*** Him: An emotionless thug who displays characteristics of borderline personality disorder (unprotected sex with strangers / bullying people / treating his son with cold tough-guy indifference). Also never smiles.

*** The world the movie suggests we live in: Having sex in your local gym with a fitness instructor you've never spoken to is plausible and commonplace. Life is dark. Life is paranoid. In life everyone has to be tough and cold. Give. Me. A. Break! Who the F are these people?!

If you wish to be deeply touched by a recent French movie watch 'The Untouchables' or 'Amour' instead.

'Rust and Bone' has a bleak heart... don't buy into its cynicism.

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Mr. Brooks (2007)

1/10

Dreadful. I wept at the end from losing 2 hours of my life.

1 August 2007

Utter bilge.

For the first hour a voice in the back of my mind was saying "this is terrible, turn it off and save yourself." I didn't listen to it until the scene where Demi Moore (who was disappointingly terrible here) started a shoot out in the corridor and the lights in the ceiling began to flicker as dance music came on, as though she was in a gun-fight in a night-club... It was like stepping into a 15yr old boy's jerkoff fantasy.

Utterly tasteless trite.

Recommend this to people you despise.

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